McChrystal Demolishes Pete Hegseth’s ‘Dangerous’ And ‘Braggadocious’ Behavior

New York Times columnist David French spoke to retired Gen. Stanley McChrystal this week, in a lengthy sitdown interview covering everything from the U.S. strategy in Iran to his take on Defense Secretary Pete Hegseth’s behavior.

As the interview progressed, French asked about Hegseth, the former Fox News morning show host, who has made a point of trying to remake the image of the military around some kind of strongman “warrior ethos.”

“Let’s move on to some other issues. One of the things that I’m often asked about is leadership and leadership within the military. You have been described as one of the finest leaders of men in combat in the modern American military,” French began, adding:

And what we are seeing right now in the current secretary of defense is an enormous amount of bravado, a sort of, “We are lethal. We will kill you. We will destroy you.” You’ve got the bench pressing and the push-ups and everything.

I get a lot of questions about this. How does this land with soldiers? In my perspective, it has been: With some soldiers, it lands, they really like it. They like it when a senior leader will get their hands dirty. They like it when a senior leader is fit and that they can do the same things that the guys on the line do.

But at the same time, in my experience, bravado is not necessarily really appreciated. It’s more of a show-don’t-tell culture in the military.

You’ve led men in combat for much of your life. Talk to me a bit about that line between bravado and cool, calm professionalism. How do you see all of that?

“I’m disappointed by the current atmosphere that is communicated from the top. I had the honor and opportunity to serve with some of the most elite forces, people who really did some extraordinary things, but they didn’t beat their chest about it,” McChrystal replied, who resigned during President Obama’s first term as the leader of all troops fighting in Afghanistan over criticism of then Vice President Joe Biden. He added:

They weren’t braggadocious. That’s just not the way they behaved.

The danger of some of that verbiage now is that much of the force is 18 years old, and it’s influenceable. They see that and they go, “Wow, that’s the way we ought to think. That’s the way we ought to be. We are superior.”

And there’s another reality that, particularly in today’s military, the number of people who really need to have big biceps and be able to kick open the door is minuscule, because most of the force is intelligence, communications, logistics — all the enablers that allow you to, with great accuracy, put in that very small number of operators.

So, when you say, “All people should look like me” — that would be a disaster.

I think people ought to look like whatever they look like so that they are capable in their jobs. I think the idea that we wouldn’t want gay or transgender service members to serve — if they’re good — is preposterous. I want whoever’s good to serve.

You also get different perspectives. What we found in the counterterrorist force, when I was young, it was sort of homogenous. It was white males with good posture. And by the time you got to Iraq 2007, as we had matured, it had become a meritocracy of older men and women, young people, all this difference, because they had proven they were contributory to the fight.

So, your ticket to being accepted was no longer just your bench press. It was, “Are you smart? Are you committed? Will you be a good colleague?” That became a much healthier force, if we would think that way.

I even have a problem with the word warrior. Traditionally, warriors were separate from soldiers. The difference between an army and a mob is discipline and leadership and uniform code of military justice.

It’s why we operate in a certain controlled way — because when you give young people the ability to carry weapons that can take life, you have to have a level of discipline, part of which is values and culture. And part of it is just military-prescribed discipline. It’s essential.

“Yeah. If I think of it like this, big brains are more important than big biceps,” agreed French before moving on.

Watch the clip above.

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